The Road Less Travelled
by Milliecake
Summary: What if Charles had been at Erik's side during the final confrontation with Shaw, would history be irrevocably changed?
1. Chapter 1

Title: The Road Less Travelled

Author: Milliecake

Fandom: X-Men: First Class

Category: Angst/Adventure

Rating: T

Warnings: AU, bromance (new word of the month!) possibly slashy (I've been told) lots of spoilers for the end of the movie, including shameless dialogue theft

Disclaimer: Do not own, but if I did I'd make a sequel. And possibly make them do naughty things. For box office ratings.

Summary: What if Charles had been at Erik's side during the final confrontation with Shaw, would the course of history be irrevocably changed?

Author's Notes: I know there's been a lot of AU beach scenes, but I felt one flaw of the movie's own scenes was Charles not being with Erik in that last confrontation with Shaw, especially when he lost contact (Charles your legs were working at that point, git over there boy). I know Shaw was Erik's target, the man he'd hunted for years, but Erik cutting himself off from Charles at the end seemed like a lost opportunity, especially if he had witness the pain he was causing Charles.

I don't read X-Men but I'm sure there's some AU stuff going on, and let's face it the ending is so bittersweet, so just consider this an alternative where they have the chance to live happily ever after and have lots of adventures and mutant babies and stuff.

OoOoO

"Erik! Take my hand."

He refused to heed the command, ignoring the warning in the other's voice as fierce, gritted determination swept through Erik Lensherr. Now that he had Shaw, _literally_ within his grasp he was unwilling to let another opportunity foolishly slip through his fingers, to let another, brief moment in long years of hunting flit by as nothing but failure. _A little further_, he thought, _just a little further..._

And then hurricane winds and the savage spray of salt-water was forcing him to relinquish his grip, leaving him drenched and clinging to the landing gear of the Blackbird. But gazing downwards he held witness to his own marvel, Shaw's submarine beaching, twisting in a cacophony of grinding, sheering metal upon Cuban shores.

Over the roar of strained engines, Erik heard the same cry as before repeated above, more forcefully this time and with an accompanying shout inside his head that he couldn't ignore. He suddenly became aware of the danger Charles had seen. As the aircraft was whipped into a tailspin, as he heard the explosive detonation of a wing tearing loose, he hurled himself toward that proffered hand, never once questioning whether it would be strong enough, hold fast enough. Metal was spinning, out of control. Hauling himself inside the craft he had a moment to realise what that would mean for Charles...Charles who had never returned to the safety of his seat, had stayed, for Erik...

_Struggling to raise the mass of the submarine, Erik had found himself that child again, in the presence of Herr Doktor Schmidt, desperate and helplessly grasping, trying to make the metal move and failing as tears came to his eyes, realising he did not have the power to save his mother. And then the images inside his mind, evoking one single, bittersweet memory, the evocative scent of wax, a haze of candles._

_"Remember, the point between rage and serenity."_

_Charles' own emotions were bound within the words he sent to Erik, his heartbreak for Erik, his trust, his love for his friend. It had been enough and Erik had suddenly reached that perfect balance, calm waters meeting raging fire to focus, strengthen beyond anything he had every known. His fingers had ceased to tremble, ceased to grasp at, instead drawing _to _him, a mass of energy and raw power coming rest within his palm..._

Raven's high pitched scream propelled Erik into instinctive action, and he lunged forward, desperately throwing himself headlong over his young friend, protectively covering the slighter man with his own, broader body. Using his powers to weld them both to the hangar decking, he heard Charles' yell over his own roar as the g-force spin threatened to crush them...as the tail section they had occupied but moments before was sundered in a fiery explosion.

Floor, ceiling, up and down became a blur as the forward section of the Blackbird rolled to a thundering halt, belly to the sky. Erik slowly, painfully let go, feeling his body gently drift downwards, his powers cradling both himself and a groaning Charles for the softest landing he could manage.

Charles, dishevelled but in full possession of his not inconsiderable faculties despite the crash landing, quickly took up the mantle of leadership as they freed the others. As Charles laid out Shaw's intentions, plans stolen from the teleporter's mind, Erik stared through unbroken glass, at the felled trees, the burning sand, the explosions still ripping through fuselage of the torn tail section. The swathe of destruction caused by his enemy's vessel. The very vessel that contained Shaw.

"I'm going in." The words shot from his mouth, not as a question, not seeking permission, but Charles didn't break his verbal stride, instructing the two younger mutants to accompany Erik into clear danger.

If their youth was a concern, now was not the time to voice it. This was what they had trained for, had already risked their lives for. If Shaw's plan were to succeed, none of them could know what would be left, of either human or mutant kind. The three who stood guard in the sand before the submarine were either fools or had some plan to survive an explosion of a hundred Hiroshima proportions, enough to wipe Cuba from the world map.

Either way, they worked for Shaw and, like the woman Frost, like the greedy Swiss bank managers who gave succour to the enemy, corrupted by their stolen gold, in Erik's mind it planted them firmly in sympathiser territory. They stood in his way and he would show no mercy. The very essence of Erik Lensherr, ruthless, efficient Nazi hunter, had supplanted all else.

"Erik." Charles' cut glass tones dragged him almost unwillingly back from thoughts of that long anticipated confrontation. "I can guide you through once you're in but I need you to shut down whatever it is that's blocking me. Then we just hope to god it's not too late for me to stop him."

"Got it." It gave Erik the chance to look away, to reveal nothing as he turned to obey.

Charles, so intent upon this plan, to telepathically manipulate Shaw into surrender, failed to delve beyond the shallow waters of Erik's mind. The images there dutifully swam with thoughts of stopping Shaw, but the details...the details were for Erik alone.

As the boy, Alex, opened with a salvo, as he and Hank McCoy battled the teleporter then vanished in a puff of red miasma, Erik was already charging towards the Caspartina, hurtling over debris. Mossad trained, he was no stranger to stealth when it suited his purpose but here, where only burnished sands separated him from his goal, subtlety had no place.

The enemy mutant, climbing to his feet, was brutally flattened as Erik all but bisected the submarine, yanking a clump of shrieking metal and twisted wires from the belly of the beast, recklessly leaping through a cascade of water into Shaw's lair.

_Erik_. Charles' voice, inside his mind, was decisive. Erik had half-expected some chiding at his brash charge but none was forthcoming. _Make for the middle of the vessel. That's the point my mind can't penetrate, we have to assume that that's where Shaw is._

Prowling through the damaged vessel, ignoring the sparks, the lights flashing their warnings, Erik could sense the confidence in Charles through the link and anticipation filled the very fibres of his being, warring with the dread that had settled heavily in his stomach, a weighty, antagonising thing. He wasn't afraid, inured to pain thanks to the man he'd once known as Schmidt, but failure was a luxury he couldn't afford. And that was the true torture. He felt with certainty, within the very core of his being, that this would be his one and only chance for vengeance before the world went to hell.

_That's the nuclear reactor_, Charles informed him as he paused before a panel. _Disable it._

Erik obeyed slowly, relishing the movement. In perverse pleasure, he stripped Shaw of this latest feast, the memory of a bar of chocolate pushed across a desk rearing in his mind, the way Schmidt had greedily savoured the luxury while outside people had starved, hungry and skeletal, beyond the comfort of the office walls.

The now familiar sense of expectation coiled like a snake in his belly. His enemy would now be alerted to his presence, that Erik was coming. For him.

Would Shaw know fear? Would there be that faintest worry at the back of the mutant's mind, the possibility that retribution, no matter how long or how far he had come, might now find him? Would guilt, shame, the singular terror that every Nazi, every collaborator that Erik had hunted down, too be his?

Schmidt had been an inexorable, tyrannical presence to his young mind, delighting in wanton destruction, entirely at ease with Erik's terrifying abilities. Vindictive and cruel. Would Shaw, this clean-shaven, decadent businessman be any different?

The hatch swung outwards at a bare command, Erik's eyes furiously searching through scattered opulence, finding only an empty room.

_Erik, you're there, you've reached the void._ Charles voice was low, intent, a subtle warning to be on guard, to be ready.

"He's not here Charles," he said aloud, his voice rising with the growing sense he'd been thwarted, yet again. "Shaw's not here! He's left the sub." He said the last with frustrated certainty. With the teleporter in the vicinity, Shaw could be anywhere by now.

_What?_ Charles sounded as frustrated as he felt._ He's _got _to be there. He has to be. There's no where else he can be. Keep looking._

Did he think Erik blind? "And I'm telling you he's not," he snapped back, his temper growing. "There's no one here goddamit."

_You've sent me on a fools errand, Charles_, he thought, angrily, uncaring if that got sent back through the link. He should never have trusted someone else to this, not even Charles, should have relied on the instincts that had brought him thus far.

The smooth, opening glide of a door behind him echoed as a chill that swept up his back as a caress, the fine hairs on the back of his neck pricking as he half-turned to the figure that awaited him.

"Erik". His voice was softer than he remembered, but still held that deceptive gentleness, echoing through the helmet he wore. "What a pleasant surprise."

_Erik_? _Erik_! A burst of alarm, bright, cerulean concern flooding his head.

But his mind had shut down of its own accord, thoughts turning leaden, cold and silent as he turned to finally gaze upon the man he had hated and hunted for near to two decades.

The night strike upon the boat had given Erik little more than a glimpse, but now...now through the slanted, twisted doorway he could see that Schmidt had barely aged, if at all. Shaw, this new outer shell, was different, more...soft, suave, less of the scholarly, pernicious Herr Doktor. But while the chameleon appeared to have slewn off old skin, inside those benevolent, smiling eyes Erik, familiar with every look, every word through countless nightmarish memories, could see the soul remained the same.

Cruelty a fist within a velvet glove, power easily restrained and easily abused, that same confidence and delight in all things terrible.

"So good to see you again." Even his words failed to sound disingenuous, as if he were truly pleased.

Erik approached, slowly, one foot before the other. His rage was a cold, icy metal that deadened his mind and he could sense Charles, struggling, fighting to reach his thoughts, frantically calling his name. As the door slid shut behind him, an intimate, claustrophobic sealing, he felt the younger man cut off entirely and he wasn't displeased. Charles' friendship was a warmth that was a danger to his plans.

Shaw continued in that same velveteen voice. "May I ask you something?"

Erik came to a stop before his enemy.

OoOoO

Erik's mind was an impenetrable sheet of iron, and Charles called his name, within and without, seeking something to grasp, to latch onto.

He could see Sebastian Shaw through Erik's eyes, could feel the slow thump of Erik's heart, could sense the coiled tautness of his friend as he approached the man. But Erik wasn't responding. And as he entered the mirrored room, as a multitude of refracted Eriks came to stand before the man they knew as Shaw, as the door slid downwards like a scythe, suddenly Charles couldn't sense him at all.

"He's gone." Fear, frustration made him bite out the words, dropping his hand uselessly. He hadn't anticipated this. How had he not _prepared _for this?

"What?" Moira, crouched over communications, sounded confused. She had not been party to their conversation.

Erik's thoughts had been...frightening, in their lack of emotion, their lack of responsiveness in the wake of Shaw's emergence. Charles had never idolised Erik, though he was fascinated by the man, had always known this side of his friend existed, that cold, lupine capacity, honed, predatorial instincts that allowed Erik Lensherr to exact his vengeance with breathtaking cruelty.

And how he had exacted that vengeance, compelled by an anger, a rage so all consuming that it had become an integral part of him. He had hunted down his persecutor through the years, but his pain had found many others along the way, just as deserving, their guilt a palpable stench, their lives a stain on all that was good.

Charles had not shied from those memories, those unforgiving judgements. He had never allowed himself to be deceived by his ideal of the man, an Erik Lensherr freed of his grief, his torment. But only through the contact of their minds had he hoped to sway the older man, to mirror back to him that very same ideal, of his potential, of what he _could_ be.

"He's gone into the void," he explained, desperation making his voice sharper than he had intended. "I can't communicate with him there."

Erik must have known, must have guessed what that room would do to Charles' telepathy.

He intended to confront Shaw alone.

Gazing through a shattered window at the Caspartina, pushing aside a sense of betrayal, Charles realised he couldn't allow Erik to do it. Erik was his friend, a _good _man, burdened enough by memories, the horror of the camps, the brutal murders committed by his hand. They both knew killing Shaw wouldn't bring him peace but killing Shaw would be an irrevocable act. A line that, once crossed, there would be no coming back from.

Erik needed to know he could be the better man, that he could be free. Charles was determined to show him how.

"I'm going after him," he told Moira, suddenly, picking his way through the damaged section before she could reply.

"Then I'm going with you." Raven, yellow eyes fierce, started to follow.

He didn't need to read her thoughts to guess her concern for Erik, that she was oh so determined to be a part of this. But out there, her mutant powers wouldn't have much use and the limp she attempted to hide was all too obvious. And she was his sister. He'd once sworn to keep her safe, one promise he fully intended to keep.

"No," he ordered, emphasising his instructions with an echoing thought inside her mind. "You must stay here Raven, guard Moira."

She looked ready to argue, glancing back at the grey clad CIA agent, but he had already taken off, running through the sand after Erik as he'd once chased after the man through the grounds of the Russian Defence Chief's estate. He had the terrible feeling, as he had back then, that Erik was about to commit a horrifying mistake.

Glancing out of the corner of his eye, he could make out hazy shapes across the watery distance.

_Moira, get those ships out of here_, he flung to the woman as he ran, knowing the concise message would be somewhat lost as movement and his concern for Erik sapped his concentration. If Shaw managed to carry out his plan, the loss of those vessels in an unclear nuclear devastation would inevitably trigger war.

OoOoO

"Why are you on their side?

Wordlessly, Erik regarded the man he had come to kill. Barely hearing that soft voice, the American accent, it was Schmidt's harsh, Germanic tones, Schmidt's clinically inquisitive eyes watching him and Erik fought not to be that child again. Fought not to be the broken boy who had screamed and suffered under that unremitting curiosity, fought against the devastating memory of wishing for death, envying those who passed daily through the gates...

He could barely draw breath as Shaw continued, his voice stroking as if a favoured pet.

"Why fight for a doomed race that will hunt us down as soon as they realise their reign is coming to an end?"

He looked at Erik as if he _were _that boy again, a specimen whose inexplicable traits were to be laid out under harsh lights and restraints and forceps. This time, the scalpel was aimed at Erik's soul.

Erik lashed out with his left hand, a clenched fist, without even realising his intention to physically strike. Shaw's head snapped to the side, blurred then came back into focus, the man standing as before, as if Erik had never even struck him.

It was then Erik began to understand the other mutant's devastating abilities, the reason Schmidt had never shown fear as metal crushed and scythed and sheered at a Jewish boy's command.

"I'm sorry for what happened in the camps."

Shaw's words were a knife's edge dragging across an old, unhealed scar. Fresh blood welled as salt water in Erik's eyes. He felt crushed beneath the weight of the lie, the realisation that in the face of Shaw's impenetrable powers he _was _still that child.

All those men and women Erik had hunted, interrogated, killed, their eyes had all held a hidden, filthy shame, belying their pleading innocence. They had condemned themselves.

Behind Shaw's eyes within the helm, there was no remorse, no humanity, the lives of those people, Erik's own family, nothing but specks of dirt to be brushed aside by a god.

"I truly am."

The kindly smile at the mouthed platitude revealed the façade.

As if reading Erik's thoughts, Shaw brought one hand up and gently touched the younger man's forehead.

Instantly, Erik felt himself flung backwards by the sheer power that coursed through that simple touch, an explosive force that sent him crashing into the mirrored wall like an insect casually flicked by a finger, cracking the fragile glass, to fall with a pained, breathless grunt to the floor.

OoOoO

Charles skidded to a stop in a spray of sand, fingers flying to his temple. _He's back_, he thought, in a surge of delight, unsure if he'd said the words aloud. Erik was back, but the connection was tenuous, nebulous. He remained as still as possible in order to focus down the thin thread that led to Erik's mind, realising he was vulnerable like this, frozen and out in the open, aware a battle was being fought on the beach behind him.

He could only trust the others to do their work as he would not abandon Erik to the man who had caused him such pain, even at the cost of his own exposure.

He stretched his telepathy, straining his ability as much as he was able to reach the other man through what could only be the slimmest of cracks in Shaw's shielding, psychic, metaphorical fingers intertwining between the bars of a cage.

_Erik whatever you're doing, keep doing it, it's starting to work_. He hadn't meant to sound quite so jubilant, not when they still had a long way to go, but relief that Erik was still alive, still able to hear him, overwhelmed all else.

Erik himself resonated raw pain, not just physical cuts and forming bruises, and Charles suddenly received a strong impression of two soldiers screaming as their helmets crushed inwards, a cold, deadly fury, then Erik's frustration as he was somehow thwarted from doing the same to Shaw.

And Charles could hear Shaw now, oil over water, as he spoke down to Erik, earnest, patronising, unaware or uncaring of the other man's silent, failed intent.

"...but everything I did, I did for you. To unlock your power, to make you...embrace it."

Through Erik's eyes Charles briefly saw Shaw's hand reach beneath his chin as if to raise his face, then Erik was flying, crashing, shards reining down. Shaw's power was truly staggering, seemingly immense, limitless. Charles had felt the pulse of energy he had used to strike at Erik and it was but a fraction, a minuscule, of what he truly had at his command.

A cell door to the void had yawned wide at Shaw's casual brutality and destruction of the mirrors and Charles' mind hungrily filled the broken room, coming to alight on his friend's agony.

_It's working_, he told Erik, grimly, hoping he knew his pain was not for naught. _I'm starting to see him but I can't yet touch his mind_.

_A little further Erik_, he thought to himself.

OoOoO

_I'm with you my friend._

Dragging himself upright, Erik gazed with loathing at the smug, satisfied features of his enemy, hidden behind that damned helmet, the item incongruous, out of place amongst Shaw's decadence and comforts. And nothing had responded to his call within the shiny encasing, no alloy to prick its ears at the master's call, nothing to warp and bend and use to drive through Shaw's skull into soft brain tissue below.

_It's the damned helmet_. Erik wasn't sure if the belated thought was his own or Charles', but he knew, however Shaw had devised it, it had been made not just to guard against Charles' telepathy, but against Erik's powers as well.

"You've come a long way from bending gates," Shaw said, as if reading his thoughts, a paternalistic smile curving his lips. "I'm so proud of you."

It was the wrong thing to say and Erik felt white-hot rage erupt. Metal surged at his furious command, girders speared through ceiling, pipes lancing through walls, spraying glass, every twisted piece of metal becoming a lethal weapon that Erik violently used to strike at his enemy.

Looking up, he was shocked to discover Shaw unharmed, not a single scratch, Erik's deadly hail of metal nothing more than a child's tantrum that had only impeded the man's slow walk towards him.

"And you're just starting to scratch the surface," Shaw continued his prowl, cajoling, encouraging, as if nothing amiss had even occurred. "Think how much further we could go. Together."

The last said as Erik blew outwards the curved section of the outer hull he had thrown between them, pushing back against Shaw's approach with everything he had, stray shards of metal caught up in his desperate bid to stall the other man and whipping with lethal speed across the room.

Shaw remained unmoved, unharmed, the girder buckling as it was caught between two competing powers. As if noticing Erik's efforts for the first time, efforts that were increasingly appearing as little more than a child tugging at an adult's trousers for attention, Shaw's splayed fingertips touched and pushed lightly back and suddenly Erik was rammed against pipes, a cry of pain escaping his lips.

Shaw's sadistic conceit filled his vision.

END OF PART ONE


	2. Chapter 2

Title: The Road Less Travelled

Author: Milliecake

Fandom: X-Men: First Class

Category: Angst/Adventure

Rating: T

Warnings: AU, bromance (new word of the month!) possibly slashy (I've been told) lots of spoilers for the end of the movie, including shameless dialogue theft

Disclaimer: Do not own, but if I did I'd make a sequel. And possibly make them do naughty things. For box office ratings.

Summary: What if Charles had been at Erik's side during the final confrontation with Shaw, would history be irrevocably changed?

Author's Notes: Thanks for the reviews. I was intending to leave this at the end of the confrontation with Shaw, but am debating whether to carry on into the entire beach scene and rewrite that for a more happier ending too. By the by, if anyone is looking for a laugh head to youtube and look for x-men first class crack by Jate. That vid had me in stitches!

OoOoO

Agony and the bitterness of defeat swept through Charles as he stood frozen on the beach. The emotions were not his own and it was with some effort he distanced himself from them.

Behind him, at the wreckage of the Blackbird, he absently caught the sound of battle once again, but his focus was intent upon Erik. _Hold on. Erik, just hold on_, he implored the other man.

Erik was trapped now behind metal debris of his own making, Shaw carefully supporting his head, the gesture incongruous with the hurt he had casually inflicted.

_I don't want to hurt you Erik,_ Charles heard Shaw say, low and earnest, as if negating Charles' silent accusation. _I never did. I want to help you_.

Erik's anguish was a tangible thing and Charles couldn't hold back the sting of tears as his friend's undiluted pain washed over him.

Shaw's tone dropped further, as if aware of Charles' own presence, to become a coaxing caress, beguiling in his sincerity. _This is our time, our age. We are the future of the human race. You and me, son. This whole world could be ours._

In the last, there wasn't the promise of possibility, but a certitude of a rapidly encroaching future. Charles didn't have to read Shaw's mind to know the man was hell bent on a genocidal course, that it was only a matter of time before he took what he saw as his rightful place upon a dais of destruction. In Emma Frost's mind Charles had seen all too clearly Shaw's vision of a future, worshipped as a god, not among wretched men, but by a powerful mutant brethren.

Erik would surely be destroyed before he joined Shaw for the extinction that was to come. Wouldn't he?

Chess had become the neutral ground where their diversive ideologies could meet and exchange their thoughts with relative peace. Evolution, the holocaust, the nature of human life to destroy that which it feared, Charles was under no illusions where Erik's loyalties had come to rest. Erik could only see in each mutant they discovered a potential victim, something to be registered, experimented on, corralled into camps...eliminated. He wanted to offer them strength instead, protection, a brotherhood, at the great cost of those who might one day do them harm.

But would a survivor's guilt, a desperate need to re-write the inhumanity of his past and defend an emerging, threatened people, eclipse the hatred Erik held for Shaw?

Fear spurred Charles into action and, struggling to hold onto their link, he ran for the second, shredded opening Erik had unwittingly blown in the submarine's side. One that led directly into the reactor room.

OoOoO

_Erik, don't give up._

Erik didn't raise his eyes. There was no need. The elation he had felt on raising the Caspartina had vanished, fallen into failure. The expectations of a dozen years had been stripped from him, his weakness exposed before the very man he had come to kill.

"Everything you did made me stronger, made me the weapon I am today." The confession spilled from his lips. There was no use in hiding. "That's the truth." His words cracked at the last.

Images of those he had mercilessly hunted and executed, men, women...soldiers whose crime had been to follow the orders of a mad regime, rose up around him. Yet all of it had been but a sidestep on his true mission and none of those deaths, messy, vindictive, cruel, had brought him the vengeance he had for so long craved. Shaw's power hungry gaze never left his face.

And there was no revelation to be had in this, no moment of self-discovery. "I've known it all along."

His eyes didn't flicker as saw movement in mirrored shards. He didn't need to look, didn't need a telepath's ability, to sense Charles had entered the devastated room, had heard his words, was even now gazing at him with that boundless compassion, azure eyes bright with unshed tears. And it wasn't simply Erik's pain alone inside his mind, Charles all too willing to martyr himself on the suffering of those whose minds he touched. No, it would be the man's enduring empathy, his kindness, his belief in Erik, that would cause him to weep. Naivety had been a kinder word than arrogance and so much more befitting.

_Erik, you are so much more than this, more than just a weapon_.

Charles hadn't spoken aloud, this wasn't for Shaw, but instead his friendship poured directly into Erik's mind, a single image held up to counter those of the brutal acts he had committed. A rare breakfast between them, not so long ago, the younger mutants still abed. A coffee mug held in an easy grip, early morning sun slanting through the panes of glass, warmth on his relaxed face, and Erik saw himself through his friend's eyes. A man at peace.

As if hearing Charles' silent plea, Shaw glanced behind him, grin wicked and widening at the sight of the telepath he had long sought, before his gaze returned to Erik, his craving naked, delighting in all that he had heard, savouring Erik's words, his surrender.

Erik looked at Shaw then, despising this man for flaying open his very soul. All what he was, all that he had become, was because of this man. The murder of his mother, the pain that had taught him, the hatred that had fuelled him. The loathsome words he had uttered at the Villa Gesell had not been wrong. He was Frankenstein's monster, the Adam of his enemy's iniquitous labours. He uttered them once more, what he knew Shaw longed to hear.

"You are my creator."

He had the briefest glimpse of Shaw's elation, his grinning triumph...before the snaking wires spread wide at his command and snatched the helmet from the man's head with the speed of a striking serpent.

"Now Charles!" he shouted and heard an echoing cry of effort from the younger man.

They had finally shown their hand, this plan Charles had concocted, their moment of truth; whether Charles was strong enough to contain Shaw and all his powers...or whether they would fail at the last as Shaw destroyed them all.

Shaw was no fool and had spun the instant he felt cold air hit his head, hand out-stretched. But not for the helmet, no, as it hovered tantalisingly above. Instead he was striking for Charles. Charles who had staggered under the strain of holding captive such a powerful mutant, with little more than the sheer tenacity of his telepathy, gloved fingers digging into his sweating temple. If Shaw were to break free, his first target would be the one and only real threat in the room.

"Charles?"

"I can only control him for so long," Charles warned, voice taut, breaking under duress. Shaw's hand trembled slightly before freezing once more.

It would be all the time Erik would need. He allowed the girder that had pinned him like an insect to fall and stepped carefully over the metal, coming to face his _creator_. Held immobile by Charles' telepathy, Erik could finally gaze upon his antagonist, not as the boy who was once his victim, but as the man who had come to kill him.

_I've blocked his powers_, Charles said, needlessly, into Erik's mind. The cost of speech was clearly too much, his focus entirely upon holding Shaw. _But if he breaks free for even a second, he'll use them on me. I can see it in his mind._

The last said lowly, with a shred of disgust. Yes, naivety had been kinder than arrogance, but perhaps innocence would have been the better word. Charles, with his privileged upbringing, an ability that all but begged indulgence, held an idealistic view that saw goodness in everything...in a killer like Erik, in a race that would inevitably battle its own extinction. Maybe he'd even thought to find it in a man like Shaw.

_How disappointing it must be_, Erik thought, _to come face to face with the reality._ A reality he had suffered under long enough.

It was with a certain amount of contempt that he surveyed Shaw now, this thin, soft, seemingly fragile man in an expensive suede suit. With Charles blocking Shaw's own mutant powers, his absorption of energy, his impenetrable hide were nothing but figments. Here and now he was flesh and bone. Like any man. Like any _human_.

_He won't sleep_, Charles continued, sounding frustrated and Erik sensed him take both a physical and psychic breath. _But I can still attempt to rewrite his memory, though something this complex I'll need time._

And Erik felt his anger boil up through that cold layer of iron to freeze along its frigid surface, darkness finally exposed to the light. In Charles' bright and hopeful mind he could see Shaw eking out a new existence as a reformed man. Quiet rage began to pour into every fibre of his being like molten steel into the forge.

_Could Charles hold both Shaw and another_? he wondered. In as much as Charles had taught and encouraged them all to push the limits of their abilities, their mentor himself had never been given such an opportunity to test his own boundaries, had shied from Erik's frankly cruel suggestions...as if using his telepathy to pick up girls had been any less ignoble.

But if he attempted to stop Erik, if in doing so it broke that critical concentration, Shaw might win free and his first target would be Charles.

A fear that was not his own abruptly filled his mind and he knew Charles had realised his intent, seen those ugly thoughts he had kept hidden just so this moment could arrive. He couldn't risk Charles loosing Shaw. And if were honest, he couldn't stand one more moment of the warmth, the disappointment, the sound of Charles _begging _inside his mind.

"Sorry Charles," he said aloud, as the wires responded to the briefest command, obediently lowering his prize into his hands.

_Erik, please. Be the better man. You have it in you..._

"It's not that I don't trust you," he continued, ignoring those low, beseeching whispers.

And he did, he did trust Charles. Foolish, insufferable, _innocent _Charles. Charles would try to do the right thing because he still believed in whatever good remained in Erik. Erik trusted him to do the right thing by his friend, but the right thing was not what Erik had come here for. He was Schmidt's creation, a weapon of metal and magnetism, and no weapon had ever been created to be merciful.

Alien material slipped over his head and he heard Charles' mental cry _Erik there will be no turning _back! And then silence.

END OF PART TWO


	3. Chapter 3

Title: The Road Less Travelled

Author: Milliecake

Fandom: X-Men: First Class

Category: Angst/Adventure

Rating: T

Warnings: AU, bromance (new word of the month!) possibly slashy (I've been told) lots of spoilers for the end of the movie, including shameless dialogue theft

Disclaimer: Do not own, but if I did I'd make a sequel. And possibly make them do naughty things. For box office ratings.

Summary: What if Charles had been at Erik's side during the final confrontation with Shaw, would history be irrevocably changed?

Author's Notes: Currently this ends at, well, the end, as there's some other XFC stories I'd like to explore. XFC DvD and Blueray out in Sept!

OoOoO

Irrevocable, funereal silence. The solemn closing of a door. Then, bizarrely, laughter errupting from the one remaining source of thought.

Charles, within Shaw's mind, curled his lip in furious resentment and it was Shaw's laughter, who had clapped _wunderbar!_ to Erik, his protege. Shaw who still laboured under the illusion that Erik, the prodigal son, had finally come home. He didn't yet realise what Erik intended, what terrible thing Charles had only but glimpsed within his friend's mind.

Charles tried to take a faltering step towards Erik, to tear loose that detestable helm, but felt his hold on Shaw abruptly begin to slide and he quickly stilled himself, realising that physically he was in as much a captive as Shaw was. He had trapped them both.

"Don't do this Erik!" Frustration tore at the words. Sounding them aloud cost him too as it became less and less likely he would have the power to wipe Shaw before Erik took his vengeance. He just needed _time_.

Erik disregarded him, as if the helm were keeping out not just thoughts, but all else. Watching through Shaw's wide eyes, he saw Erik slowly pace towards the man he had once known as Schmidt, an unconscious imitation of his enemy's earlier movements. He came to stop just inside Shaw's reaching hand, the immobile palm almost a parody of a caress against his face.

His voice dropped, adopting those same, soft, intimate tones as he regarded the other man, strangely earnest. "If you're in there I'd like you to know I agree with every word you said. We are the future."

And Shaw exulted.

_You see, boy_, Shaw's voice was a reptilian whisper, slithering over Charles' thoughts and trailing corruption in its wake. _It's inevitable. We _will _rule this world. Release me. _Join _me._ An insubstantial hand was proffered across his psyche and Charles sensed with shock that Shaw was sincere.

Shaw was a man who had come into his mutation so very long ago, who had seen his powers, his immortality, as gifts not to aid, but to destroy and plunder and take, as a child that knows no consequences. He envisioned himself once more, adulated as a god among gods. Standing at his right hand was Erik Lensherr.

And at his left, Charles Xavier. The most feared and adored of them all.

_You fool_, Charles savagely thought back, twisting away from imagery that a man like Shaw believed seductive, feeling the other mutant's anger surge at his refusal

Shaw shook at the bars of the cage Charles had errected with such force a bead of sweat broke out, rolled down features already damp with a strain and a focus that was slowly fraying under the effort. Shaw pushed at Charles' control with the same brute force of his powers and it was by sheer dint of stubborn will that Charles refused to crumple.

"But," and suddenly Erik was turning away, turning his back on the one he had named creator, his voice strangely, disturbingly flat, "unfortunately you killed my mother."

Charles felt that first real flash of uncertainty run through his captive, a feeling that was old, aberrant.

Sebastian Shaw was a man who had not known fear in a very long time.

An image of a Jewish woman, gaunt, respectful, fearful, whispering _alles ist gute_, the same gentle woman from Erik's memory celebrating the sabbath in the Warsaw ghetto. The crack of a bullet in a quiet office made Charles jump, then...ineffable sadness. A boy began to weep.

_Erik, still this? _Shaw clucked, sounding...disapproving. _She was nothing. A means to an end. And look where it has brought you, how far you have come!_

The thoughts were despicable, those of a murderer who had executed a harmless woman for his own selfish ends. Shaw's regard for humanity was nothing more than a heaving mass of weak flesh, to be used and discarded at will for his purpose and pleasure, broken, eradicated. Charles had no intention of relaying the sickening message to Erik, no intention of hastening the horror he could see fast approaching them all.

Brought before Shaw's riveted eyes was a coin, the silver Reichsmark innocuous enough yet its meaning...tremendous. Charles felt himself press the freshly minted metal into a child's hand, knew it for one of Shaw's memories and not his own.

Charles had seen that coin, albeit rarely. The banned symbol, the stolen wealth and suffering and death behind its creation, he hadn't needed to ask Erik why he carried such an abombinable item. He had witnessed all too clearly in terrible memories the damage that single coin had done.

"This is what we're going to do." Erik's face was blank, impassive, as unreadable as his mind.

Shaw had suddenly fallen silent. Watching.

"No. Please Erik no." Charles managed to bite out the words, his mind torn between his own and Shaw's, knowing what was coming. A heinous act.

And Erik...Erik was to make a murderer of him.

"If I were to release him..." Charles threatened, through trembling lips, chest heaving with the effort of containing Shaw, legs barely holding him now as he pressed his fingers so hard into his skin he knew there would be bruises.

Erik did pause at this, washed out eyes sliding to the side but never quite reaching Charles' strained, dishevelled features. After a moment, "No. You won't." That same, soft, dead tone.

And he was right. Goddamn him, he was right. If it were only Charles' own life at stake...

But it was more than that, much more. The threat of nuclear war, nuclear winter, _genocide_, hung over billions of lives.

"I'm going to count to three and I'm going to move the coin," Erik continued, in that same detached voice. The coin floated upwards from his hand. "One."

Shaw raged. He threw himself against Charles' mind, furious, battling against the young mutant's grip, the mental restraints that bound him to an phantasmal chair of execution.

"_Please _Erik." The tumbling plea was near broken, shuddery and breathless, but it was all that Charles had left as tears sprang to his eyes at his friend's cold, merciless disregard. _Don't do this_.

Without his powers, Shaw could be killed as easily as a cockcroach. But this method...it would destroy any goodness within Erik. It would destroy Charles.

His entreaty fell on a hardened heart of iron.

Shaw was still fighting him, fighting for his life, but the whispers in his mind were begging, cajoling. _You don't want to do this, son_, and Charles couldn't be sure if the words were aimed at Erik or himself. He saw images of power and wealth, skyscrapers of towering metal and human slaves bent in worship, the telepath Emma Frost, Charles himself, naked, beaten and broken amongst crumpled sheets of red. Shaw's desperate bribes, constructs of degradation and hedonistic gratification flashed through Charles' mind, thankfully too fast to gain anything but a glimpse of Sebastian Shaw's sickening promises as the megalomaniac came slowly came undone.

Shaw could offer anything humanly possible and more. Everything except the one thing he had taken.

Erik's mother.

And Charles could see all too clearly that in just one instance of freedom Shaw would direct his power at the telepath, would destroy him in a searing instant, then unleash his might upon an unsuspecting world.

And Erik...Erik would know the wrath of a god.

"Two."

Charles tensed, fought to breathe through his silent struggle, feeling the hideous anticipation of agony within each heaving shudder. And then the coin was slowly spiralling towards him, a captive within Shaw's body, a witness through the condemned man's eyes. This was to be no quick, easy death.

His mantra _Don't do this Erik_, had turned to a plaintive, _How can you do this_? But neither thought would ever reach his friend.

Didn't Erik realise what this would do to Charles?

Caught between minds, unable to relinquish Shaw to his own fate, Charles could only prepared himself, his own body braced. He would not be spared the agony, he had no choice but to experience, and become both victim and murderer in one gruesome, drawn out act. And with each breath he drew, each brief inhalation like a man about to feel the water close over his head, he _hated _Erik.

In that moment, he hated him with every fibre of his being.

"Three."

As the silver Reichsmark pressed through his/Shaw's thin flesh, began to grind through bone, Charles could only open his mouth and scream.

OoOoO

The scream was not Shaw's.

Erik blinked, the sound pricking at the cold, indifferent shell that had crystallized about him. He had imagined this moment for so long, the satisfaction, the triumph of long awaited justice finding its mark. But watching Shaw die by these means, by the very same power the man had caused him to bring forth, Erik Lensherr felt only emptiness.

And a familiar pain, one that had shadowed him since his mother's death, its presence ever a constant, even now. He knew then, in that moment, it would never leave him.

Shaw was not screaming. In fact his face was marbled flesh, eyes wide. The shock in them would be indelibly etched into Erik's memory.

Once passed the bone, the coin slipped more easily, with an unpleasant wet suction that did not move Erik, did not bring him satisfaction.

The scream continued, raw and hard, the agony within resounding uncomfortably against Erik's ears, attempting to distract him from the moment.

There was no pleasure to be found in this, no peace, no relief. Just...finality. He would never be that boy again. He would never be weak, never be at the mercy of those who would do him and his kind harm.

But the scream...

Unwittingly, Erik's glance flicked to his right. A man in yellow and black, hair unkempt, mouth wide, taunt and screaming, his entire body arched in a rictus of agony.

_Listen to me very carefully my friend. Killing Shaw will not bring you peace._

The coin slowed.

_There's so much more to you than you know, not just pain and anger. There's good too, I felt it. _

And faltered.

_You're not alone. Erik, you're not alone._

Then stopped.

_Charles..._

His glacial composure suddenly shattered, dispassion evaporating under a terrible realisation and Erik swung towards his friend, fists clenching, abandoning Shaw without a moment's consideration.

"Charles," he said, uselessly, unable to raise his voice beyond an unsteady whisper. "What have I done..." Had he been so utterly blinded by his anger and pain that he had not seen, not fully realised what his actions would do to the younger man? "Charles, forgive me," he tried to say, but Charles had not ceased to scream, eyes blind and unseeing, full of suffering and pain, enough for an entire lifetime.

In sudden comprehension, Erik realised his transgression, an unforgivable act. One committed against a good man, a _decent _man, who had shown him nothing but kindness and trust. Charles had been inside Shaw's head as Erik had slowly executed the man. And Shaw still hung as a marionette, which meant Charles was even now holding onto him, still trapped in the horror of feeling a man die.

Erik looked into a pair of blue eyes turned black with torment and grabbed his friend's arms with enough force to leave bruises, resisting the urge to shake him. "Stop. Charles stop!" He had no experience with the telepath's gift, no idea how to break him from the link he had with Shaw's dying mind. He grasped the back of Charles' head, pressing their foreheads together, as if he could force his thoughts into his friend's tortured mind, then realised its futility when he recalled what separated them.

The helmet.

The scream came to a faltering, juddering halt. But there was still no recognition in Charles' eyes, the pupils unseeing, dilated, distress swallowing their colour, lips curled in a grimace, his face twisted in a pain that roiled off him like waves. He was still trapped within a hell Erik had consigned him to, where the trauma was slowing driving him to insanity.

Erik released him, took a steadying breath, then struck out, letting his instincts make the decision. His fist connected sharply with the younger man's lower jaw, snapping his head to the side. In an instant, Erik was at his side to catch him, lower him no less gently than he had on the Blackbird, the older man desperately cupping Charles' face to the light, searching his friend's eyes for a semblance of reason.

Behind them, Shaw's body dropped in a tangle of unresponsive limbs, a grotesque puppet whose strings had finally been severed.

Erik's relief was palpable as he felt Charles' gloved fingers curl around his wrists in slight strength. A sudden heaving breath as if it were the telepath's first, that familiar furrowed brow, a tincture of azure beneath tousled hair...

"Forgive me, my friend," Erik whispered once more and bowed his head. He had done a great many things which would cause other men to falter under the weight of the guilt, but never since the death of his mother, his failure to save her, had he felt such shame.

But then Charles was batting against him, struggling with wild cat fury and Erik released him as if scalded, jerking his hands away, palms outward to show he meant no harm. But Charles wasn't fighting him. He was grappling for the helmet, gloved fingers digging under the sharp corners in as he furiously tried and failed to prise it from Erik's head, anguished tears clouding the blue of his eyes at each futile attempt.

Erik firmly caught his wrists, stopped his frantic movements, aware of unshed tears obscuring his own vision. Then he carefully reached up and removed the offence himself.

Charles' hand flew to his own temple, his presence in Erik's head instantaneous thereafter, but with a heavy heart Erik realised the bright quality that signified the younger man's intrusions was not there.

Whatever Charles had been desperately searching for, he suddenly found and his hand fell. He slumped exhaustedly against the wall, his panicked breathing slowing, quieting, dragging a gloved hand across his cheeks to wipe away the sweat and tears. Strangely silent.

After a moment, Erik joined him, arm resting on one drawn up knee, staring across at Shaw's body, the ugly gash that oozed a trickle of blood, the wide, unseeing eyes.

Beside him, Charles ran his hands through his hair then turned his gaze heavenward, throat working as he convulsively swallowed. "He's not dead."

Erik tensed and slowly turned to regard his friend.

"I can still sense his mind," the younger mutant continued, lowly. He looked distinctly queasy as he stared fixedly at the ceiling.

The coin began to reverberate at Erik's call, awakening deep within grey matter that still fired neurons.

"His powers are no longer there. His mind, too, is...is senseless. Destroyed." Said with an almost desperate clinical detachment.

Erik didn't glance at Shaw but suddenly Charles' hand was gripping his wrist, fierce and afraid and Erik felt fine tremours through the touch. Direct and unflinching blue eyes met grey. "Schmidt, Shaw...whatever made him...is gone my friend."

Now Erik did allow himself to turn, to look again upon his enemy, the empty husk, a breathing corpse.

"Can it be enough?" was quietly, fervently demanded of him. _Do you have it in you to allow this Erik_?

Charles in his head, twisting his words back to him.

The shot in a quiet office was loud in Erik's memory and the coin shifted.

_She wouldn't want this for you_. An image of his mother, stroking his hair, smiling through severe hardships, the love that carried him through no matter the dirt on his clothes, the hungry twisting of his belly. "You can honour her memory in far better ways, my friend."

The last was said aloud with quiet affirmation. He felt Charles' desperate grip on his wrist as if a man drowning. Which of them was going under he didn't know.

It was what neither of them had wanted, had envisaged, had intended. Unsatisfactory, but an ending nonetheless. He had been right. Peace had never been an option.

Inside Shaw's brain, the silver Reichsmark remained, quivering, waiting.

Erik let it go.

END...FOR NOW


End file.
